She's not haunting you, so let go
by Traitor of All Traitors
Summary: A positive extension to the alternate ending of the remake. Sue receives a visit that enables her to put behind her the guilt and fear she has had to live with ever since the prom.


Creation began on 01-16-14

Creation ended on 08-02-14

Carrie

She's not haunting you, so let go

A/N: Based on the alternate ending to the Twenty-Thirteen _Carrie _film. I'm uncomfortable with the ending, just as I was uncomfortable with the Nineteen-Seventy-Six version of the ending. There needs to be a different type of closure to the franchise.

After calming down from the latest nightmare of Carrie White, Sue fell to sleep again. Her mother was constantly worried about her daughter after what happened on the night of the prom nearly seven months ago. She hadn't been getting much sleep, had dark circles under her eyes, wasn't putting on much weight needed for her unplanned pregnancy, and rarely said anything beyond what she says upon waking from her nightmares. She considered getting Sue therapy, but decided to wait on it; if she had another nightmare this week, she would get her help.

-x-

Again, she found herself in the cemetery. Again, she found herself standing in front of Carrie's grave, about to place the single rose on the tombstone.

_I am so sorry, Carrie,_ she thought, about to place the rose on the grave.

Grip! A hand, as dark as the ground stripped bare of any plants, grabbed her wrist and pulled her up to her feet.

Gasp! She saw a young man, dressed in funeral attire, looking at her with a stern expression.

"I…I…" She tried to speak.

"You," he spoke up, cutting her off, "need to stop beating yourself up over this."

"It was my fault."

"It wasn't your fault. You didn't know what was going to happen."

"But I convinced my boyfriend to ask her out to the prom."

"Yes, and that was to show her a good time, not to be mean to her, not degrade her any further than people already had before that night. What happened to Carrie White wasn't your fault. It was her mother's and Chris Hargensen's fault that she died that night and suffered the humiliation she couldn't endure any longer. You tried to atone for your role in the cruelty of what occurred in the girls' shower stalls after she experienced her first period. Unfortunately, nothing went the way it was supposed to."

"Who…who are you?" She questioned him.

"Whoever you want me to be, I guess. I must be your subconscious mind, here to save you from your unnecessary grief. It's not healthy for your daughter."

Sue dropped the rose and pressed her hand against her slender waist.

"And to help you get over this grief, I brought an old face to see you." The man told her, pointing to Carrie's grave.

Sue looked back…and took a step back.

Carrie, exactly like she was before she died, sitting atop her grave.

"You can stop feeling sorry for what happened that night," Carrie told her. "It was unavoidable. I was stabbed, I would've bled out or died from the house collapsing on top of me. I chose to save you and your daughter instead of myself. What was there for me to live for?"

Sue thought about it for a minute and guessed that there wouldn't have been any way for Carrie to walk away from the prom massacre. There were so many dead, the town damaged, and graves filled with people that didn't need to die that night had she not been humiliated.

"Nothing," she confessed. "Nothing at all."

"Don't grieve for me, anymore," Carrie told her. "It's pointless to dwell on what could've happened instead of what did happen. Live for yourself and your daughter, for today and tomorrow."

Sue nodded that she would.

"Thank you," she told Carrie and the dark man.

-x-

Sue awoke the next day, feeling better than she had been before the shower incident, and got out of bed. She went to the kitchen and found her mother cooking breakfast.

"Good morning," she greeted her.

"Sue? How are you feeling?" Her mother asked in response.

"Better," she answered. "I had a good dream last night. It…actually helped clear my mind."

"Really?"

"Yeah. So, what's for breakfast today?"

"Eggs, bacon, hash-browns and pancakes."

"Sounds great."

They sat down together and started eating.

"So…what was your dream about?" Her mother asked.

"I was speaking with Carrie…and this man that was with her. She told me that what happened to her on prom night wasn't my fault, so I should stop blaming myself for her death and move on."

"So, you've finally accepted that what happened was not your fault?"

"Yeah. Well, not entirely…but I'm starting to get there now."

"That's good to hear. You constantly had me worrying ever since that night."

-x-

"…Aaurgh!" Sue grunted, trying to do as the doctor instructed of her. "Urgh!"

"The head's crowning," he told her.

"Urgh!" She groaned; it had been nearly twelve hours after her water broke late in the night and she had gone into labor, and all she felt most of the time was pain.

"One more push, Sue," the doctor told her again.

"Gaurgh!" She grunted.

One minute later, Sue was greeted with her newborn daughter.

-x-

"…Sue?" She heard her mother say to her, waking her from a heavy sleep a day later.

"Ugh, hey," she greeted her back, rising up until she was sitting on the bed.

"How do you feel?"

"Woozy… Where is she?"

"In the maternity ward. Have you decided on a name yet?"

"I have."

-x-

"…Okay, and her name's Terrie Snell," said the woman filling out the birth certificate for Sue's daughter. "Mother: Sue Snell."

-x-

"…Who's this girl in this picture here, Mommy?" A five-year-old Terrie asked her mother, pointing to a shy girl in a school yearbook.

Sue looked at the girl and explained that she was Carrie White, a girl she had tried to help prior to the night of a school prom, a sort of event that marked a sort of transition from childhood to adulthood. She was also one of two people from where her daughter got her name.

"What happened to her, Mommy?" Terrie asked.

"She passed away five years ago," Sue told her. "Her house fell on her."

"That's awful."

-x-

It was about a year later that Sue took her daughter to the cemetery to the Whites' grave, which had long been cleaned of the graffiti that was meant to disgrace Carrie's memory…and to forget about the girl people vilified after an awful prank of unforgiving proportions.

"Hello, Ms. Carrie White," Terrie spoke to the grave marker, placing a sunflower in front of it. "It's nice to meet you. I've been told about you. You were a very pretty girl."

She then looked behind herself to see Sue standing by a different grave.

"I hope you are happy in that beautiful place in the sky," she continued, and then walked away to return to her mother.

_Thank you,_ she stopped and turned to look back at the Whites' grave.

_Did someone talk to me?_ She wondered, but put it out of her mind after ten seconds.

As the Snells left minutes later, a lone figure appeared out of nowhere…and picked up the sunflower. It was a young woman, dressed in a pink dress that made her look regal or like she was to attend a prom. She was also translucent, almost completely see-through.

There wasn't a soul alive that recognized Carrie White because of the prom incident that was all but forgotten, who seemed like a guardian angel of sorts or a visiting specter.

Fin

A/N: Another completed story.


End file.
